Art News

Portrait of Fred Korematsu to be Presented at the National Portrait Gallery

WASHINGTON, DC.- Just three days after Fred Korematsu Day, Korematsu’s acheivements will be recognized by the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery with the installation of his portrait in a private ceremony at the museum. Two 1940s’-era photographs will become part of the museum’s permanent-collection exhibition, “The Struggle for Justice” Feb. 2. The photographs are gifts to the Portrait Gallery from the Fred T. Korematsu family. “I am delighted that these photographs will reside in the museum’s exhibition, ‘The Struggle For Justice,’” said Martin Sullivan, director of the museum. “Korematsu’s courageous advocacy in the courts on behalf of interned Japanese Americans was essential to ending legislated segregation.” Korematsu, an American-born citizen of Japanese ancestry (1919-2005), was a welder on the Oakland, Calif., docks before the Japanese attack on Pe